1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a simulation device for fostering a virtual creature by conducting a treatment in response to a call from the virtual creature.
2. Description of Related Art
In recent years, various electronic game devices for raising a pet such as a dog or a cat in a predetermined screen, have been proposed and sold. There have been known conventional electronic game devices of this kind disclosed in, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. JP-A-7-261962 or Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. JP-A-7-281819.
According to the conventional example disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. JP-A-7-261962, a light emitting element and a light receiving element are installed in a main body of a device and an infrared ray emitted from the light emitting element is reflected by hand or the like and received by the light receiving element by noncontact operation of a user (a player). Further, data of a plurality of patterns of dog characters and biorhythms of the dog characters are stored in a memory and accordingly, data of the dog characters in correspondence with a number of times of the noncontact operation and biorhythms of the day are selectively read from the memory and are displayed. Thereby, a character image also in correspondence with physical conditions of the dog character can be selectively displayed.
According to the conventional example disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. JP-A-7-281819 a light emitting element and a light receiving element are installed in a main body of a device and an infrared ray from the light emitting element is reflected by hand or the like and received by the light receiving element by noncontact operation of a user by which a noncontact operation distance is detected. Further, a plurality of kinds of dog character data where motion of a dog is changed such as a looking-back dog or a paw-raising dog or the like and effective sound data are stored in a memory and accordingly, the dog character data are selectively read and displayed in correspondence with the noncontact operation distance and an effective sound thereof is emitted from a speaker. In this way, the character image in compliance with gesticular order by the hand of the user can selectively be displayed.
However, according to both of the above-described conventional examples, an instruction is issued to a character image by a unilateral order from the user and there has been no conventional example where a player responds to a call or a request from the character image.